In a rare move, publisher Antoine Gallimard was summoned by the head of the French government's committee against racism, anti-Semitism and anti-LGBT hatred, who reportedly urged the publication to have notes by a group of experts, including historians. Gallimard reportedly rejected it.

In announcing the suspension of the project, Gallimard said he could not ensure "a proper job in terms of methodology and history".

He added: "Céline's pamphlets belong to the most infamous chapter of French anti-Semitism. But to censure them prevents light being shed on their ideological roots and only attracts unhealthy curiosity."

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Journey to the End of the Night is one of Céline's most famous works

Céline, who died in 1961, is regarded as a literary innovator and most famous for his 1930s novels Journey to the End of the Night and Death on Credit.

His pamphlets are not banned in France but have not been reissued since 1945.

Although the author, born Louis-Ferdinand Destouches, had said he did not want them to be republished, his widow, now 105, recently authorised a reprint.

He fled to Denmark at the end of World War Two and was convicted in absentia by a French court for collaboration with the Germans. He served a one-year jail term in Denmark and returned to France years later.